


In the Morning I'll Be Fine

by stardropdream



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Season/Series 07
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-29
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-07-18 22:20:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16127912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardropdream/pseuds/stardropdream
Summary: “I’m sorry I keep waking you up,” Shiro whispers the fifth night in and Keith shrugs, fingertips tracing the slope of Shiro’s scarred stomach.“I was always a light sleeper, anyway,” Keith tells him. “Mom’s even worse. She said it was a good skill to hone, especially in dangerous situations. By the end of the second year, one of us only had to sigh in order to wake the other up.” He tilts his head as he watches Shiro, touching his hip. “You don’t have to apologize, Shiro. I’m glad I’m here.”The sad truth is, Shiro knows he isn’t just saying that.





	In the Morning I'll Be Fine

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted to tumblr for the prompt: "Shiro has been having nightmares, but doesn't want to talk about them. After a few weeks, Shiro has a particular nasty dream and Keith presses on about it this time, because he can't bear to see Shiro suffer like this. Shiro finally breaks."

“Is it alright if I stay here tonight?” Keith asks, voice thready with sleep as he blinks slowly at Shiro, already sprawled out on Shiro’s pillow like he owns the place. He looks beautiful like that, naked and flushed, but a small smile meant only for Shiro quirking his mouth up. Shiro’s heart is still beating from the sex but also kicks up a bit at the thrill of having Keith actually stay the night with him— the thought is tempting. The idea of holding him in the night and waking up to possible morning sex is _very_ tempting. 

Things between them are new, still a little tentative and unexpressed, but Shiro hesitates not because he wants Keith to go— the opposite, god, the opposite— but because he knows what it’ll mean to have Keith lying beside him in the middle of the night when the nightmares inevitably hit him. They always do, after all. 

He hesitates too long and something shutters in Keith’s eyes and Shiro’s heart thuds. Keith flickers his eyes away, searching out where Shiro haphazardly threw his shirt before they fell into bed together, to undoubtedly get dressed and leave. 

“Oh. I, uh,” Keith begins, scrambling for something to say. 

Shiro, in a moment of panic, launches himself at Keith and pins him down on the bed. It’s not his smoothest move by any means, but he covers that embarrassment up by nuzzling into Keith’s cheek, pressing sloppy kisses along his jaw and the corner of his mouth, nose bumping against his as he squirms closer. 

Keith makes a soft sound of protest at the sudden invasion and licks Shiro’s nose in retaliation. It backfires, though, because it only makes Shiro feel soft and floaty. He laughs, breathless, and Keith catches his mouth with his, kissing him properly. His hands cup Shiro’s cheeks and it’s affectionate and gentle and Shiro hopes he’s banished away the hurt threatening to bloom up into Keith’s eyes. 

When he does pull away, Keith’s expression is soft and amused, his smile openly fond. 

“Stay with me,” Shiro tells him, just in case the _desperately kiss your boyfriend_ display wasn’t clear enough to convince Keith to stay. 

Keith pats his cheek, thumbing at the arch of Shiro’s cheekbone. His expression shifts into something more thoughtful. “Well,” he says, voice soft, but Shiro doesn’t miss that note of relief in his voice, “If you insist.” 

Shiro kisses him again and tells himself it’ll be alright. 

Keith sighs out softly into the kiss and moves closer to Shiro, throwing his leg over Shiro’s hip in a brazen display of possessiveness. Their hips notch together and if Keith hadn’t already worn him out, Shiro thinks, pathetically, that this would be enough to send him into a new next round. But Keith seems content simply with skin on skin content, nuzzling up against Shiro’s chest and resting his ear over Shiro’s heart. His smile turns softer, like he can’t believe he gets to be here like this, like it’s physically comforting to confirm Shiro’s still breathing. It probably is, Shiro thinks, with no small amount of residual longing he still feels whenever he looks at Keith. Part of him, still, can’t believe that he’s here in general, or more specifically here with Keith like this. 

He curls his arms around Keith with a soft hum and kisses his temple. He knows Keith will feel the way his heart kicks up in his chest when Keith answers with a quiet sigh of Shiro’s name. 

They must nod off like that because the next time Shiro’s aware of anything, it’s past midnight and he’s startling awake, his heart in his throat. There’s no light, aside from the glow from his prosthetic. His nightmares are nebulous things, a conglomeration of all his anxieties magnified. Tonight, he can’t be sure if he witnessed a recurring dream of being the Champion or being sent to the astral plane, but regardless of the contents, every night leaves Shiro scrubbed out like this, breathing ragged and body tense. 

Keith’s awake instantly, as soon as Shiro startles, and the wave of guilt that washes over Shiro is new, but no less felt. He should have warned Keith. He should have moved away from him so they were lying side by side rather than tangled up like this. 

“Sorry,” he says before Keith can say anything. 

Keith frowns at him, and in darkness his eyes look sharp as he drinks in Shiro’s expression, hand pressed over his pounding heart in his chest. 

“Shiro,” Keith says, quiet but concerned, and that’s worse than anything else. Shiro clenches his eyes shut, unsure what to do. He never used to get nightmares like this, not before Kerberos. And this is the first time anyone aside from himself has been witness to his nightmares. He’s mortified. 

The _I’m fine_ is already halfway to being spoken before he bites it back. It’s an old instinct, an old platitude, and one he knows won’t work with Keith. And he doesn’t want to lie to Keith, doesn’t want to hold anything back from him— not after years of both of them sitting on their feelings for one another, unspoken. He never wants to keep anything from Keith again. 

But this is just— who Shiro is now. Broken. He can’t remember the last time he had a night uninterrupted by sleep. Dragging it all up will just mean worrying Keith and leaving him puzzling over possible solutions Shiro’s already tried over and over again. 

“I don’t… want to talk about it,” Shiro tells him, and it’s the truth, and he knows that Keith will understand and accept that. It isn’t a dismissal, but it’s a setting aside. 

Keith studies his face, sympathetic but not pitying, and he reaches up to brush sweat-damp hair away from Shiro’s forehead. It is profoundly comforting. 

“Okay,” Keith tells him, voice low. The concern is obvious, but he doesn’t press it— and Shiro, once again, marvels at how deeply he loves this man. The quiet display of Keith’s trust in him, that he doesn’t push it out of him right then and there, means more to Shiro than any sort of reassurance of _it was only a dream_ could offer. 

“Thank you,” Shiro breathes. 

Keith bites the inside of his cheek, lips pressed into a thin line. But slowly, his expression relaxes and he leans in to give Shiro a soft, sweet kiss that eases the tension from Shiro’s shoulders. 

“You can tell me anything,” Keith says and his eyes are dark and intense and Shiro _aches_ with how desperately he adores him. He manages a small nod and Keith seems satisfied and moves back into his original position. He splays his hand over Shiro’s chest, tracing idly at a scar jagging across his collarbone. Shiro lifts his hand and tangles it in Keith’s hair and feels, for just a little bit, better. 

 

-

 

The next night, Keith tucked sleepily into his side, Shiro jolts awake with a winded, painful gasp as he lurches himself from a nightmare. His eyes singe with the lasting image of the nightmare— the cloning facility, his blade in Keith’s chest, Keith cut-off midway through his confession— and he doesn’t even have a chance to hope that Keith won’t wake up before Keith is hovering over him, hands light on his shoulders. Not pining him down or touching too firmly, for fear of throwing Shiro off into a full-fledged panic attack, and if he weren’t so busy feeling guilty, he’d be grateful for it. 

“Keith—” he gasps out, guilt and pain and thundering fear all coiled up and twisted in his gut. 

“I’m here,” Keith whispers and moves his hands only once Shiro glances at them with deep longing. He brushes them over Shiro’s shoulders, up his neck, cups his jaw gently. “Shiro…” 

Shiro gulps in air, trying to think of a way he can brush this off even as he knows Keith isn’t going to press him no matter how much he wants to. Keith’s hands lift to brush his hair back from his face and it’s comforting, enough that Shiro even closes his eyes for a moment, sees no onslaught of images of Keith sprawled dead on a gangway. He sucks in sharp, hurried breaths, trying to clear his head. Keith’s fingertips rub slow circles over his temples. 

“Sorry,” Shiro says, quiet. 

“I was awake anyway,” Keith answers, and Shiro accepts the lie without comment, blinking his eyes open to look up at Keith. Keith touches his cheek, brushes his thumb over Shiro’s bottom lip. “Hey,” he whispers. “You’re okay, Shiro. Everything’s okay.” 

Shiro stutters out a small nod. 

He says nothing more and Keith goes quiet, too, just brushing his fingers through Shiro’s hair as Shiro gulps in breath, trying to even out his breathing and still the rampage of his heart. It takes a while, but soon the air stops feeling so constricting and he’s able to focus on the gentleness of Keith’s hands, the tenderness in which he touches him. 

He looks up at Keith to find Keith already studying him. He offers a small smile, but says nothing, doesn’t ask the question he obviously wants to. 

Shiro’s heart thuds in his chest and he tugs Keith down to kiss him.

 

-

 

It happens every night after, for a week, but Keith keeps his word and never asks. Shiro’s mortified he keeps waking him up, but never enough to actually suggest Keith spend a night in his own room. Keith never offers it, either, not that Shiro ever thought he would. 

There’s a reassurance, at least, to waking up from dreams in which he kills Keith only to find Keith alive and well, his eyes trained on Shiro only ever with empathy, never pity or regret. 

“I’m sorry I keep waking you up,” Shiro whispers the fifth night in and Keith shrugs, fingertips tracing the slope of Shiro’s scarred stomach, dipping in the lines of his muscles. 

“I was always a light sleeper, anyway,” Keith tells him. “Mom’s even worse.” Somehow, hearing Keith call Krolia his mom warms Shiro more than any platitude could have, and he listens to Keith with a small, private smile. “She said it was a good skill to hone, especially in dangerous situations. By the end of the second year, one of us only had to sigh in order to wake the other up.” He tilts his head as he watches Shiro, touching his hip. “You don’t have to apologize, Shiro. I’m glad I’m here.”

The sad truth is, Shiro knows he isn’t just saying that— and while it makes him feel guilty, it also reassures. He gives Keith what he knows is an overly soppy look. But Keith returns it, at least, so there’s that. 

Keith’s fingers drift from his hip to pluck at the waistband of Shiro’s boxer briefs, arching his eyebrow. The question in Keith’s eyes now is, at least, one that Shiro’s willing to answer. He gives him a small smile and lets Keith bow into him. Most nights, messing around with Keith until he passes out is the only way to ensure that Shiro doesn’t dream. He tugs Keith down and kisses him deep. 

 

-

 

Shiro is used to his nightmares. They jolt him awake, leave him breathless for a little while, and then usually he’s able to fall back asleep. He doesn’t often get really bad ones, dreams so vivid that he swears they’re real and leaves him unable to sleep for the rest of the night. 

Two weeks into Keith basically living in Shiro’s sleeping quarters, and Shiro’s hit by such a nightmare. 

He rattles awake on the echoing threads of Keith’s _I hate you, I’ll never forgive you—_

He must shout, or gasp, or cry out, because Keith is there instantly. His expression this time is not reassurance, eyebrows pinched together, mouth drawn into a frown. Shiro flinches, clenching his eyes shut only to be forced to witness Keith’s dying breaths again. He snaps his eyes open, desperate, shaking all over.

He rolls onto his side and curls into the fetal position, his hand scrubbing harsh through his hair and clenching at the back of his neck, as if making himself smaller will push back images of Keith’s dying body, the blood spilling from his wounds, his last words a damnation of Shiro’s entire being. 

“Shiro!” Keith cries out, sounds worried, and that’s even worse, sounds too much like Keith’s pleas at the cloning facility. 

He shudders again, gulping down air. “I’m—”

He can’t finish the words, can’t summon up anything sensible. He shakes and doesn’t stop shaking, even when Keith drapes his body over him, touches him, tries to soothe him with comforting circles, reassuring words, but it’s too much. He fears he’ll pass out from lack of breath, another reiteration of how broken he is. He can’t, he can’t—

He doesn’t know what Keith is saying, can only hear the puff of his breath as he murmurs words into Shiro’s ear. He can’t process it. The world is white noise, buzzing around him. He’s trembling. 

He realizes, distantly, that he’s sobbing and— well, his dreams have never been this bad before. Keith murmurs to him through it and while Shiro can’t pick up the words, the cadence of his voice helps soften his own wretched, heaving sobs. He doesn’t flinch away from Keith’s touch, lets Keith drape over him, speak to him, breathe with him. He tries to focus on the sound of Keith’s voice, on the steady beat of his heart against his back, the swell of his chest as he takes deep, comforting breaths. Shiro tries to parrot his movements, tries to breathe like him. 

His body trembles even once the sobs die down, even once he’s able to breathe a little. It’s been a long time since he’s cried and he forgot what it felt like to have tear tracks dry on his cheeks, and his vision swims again as another wave of fear and regret threatens to overtake him. 

He turns his head a little, seeking out Keith— knows that, now, he won’t be able to dismiss this with a simple _I don’t want to talk about it._

Keith looks worried when Shiro turns his head. He reaches out his hand and touches Shiro’s cheek, thumb rubbing gently, cleaning him up. 

“Shiro,” Keith whispers, miserable and concerned. Shiro hates that he’s the reason to have put this concern in Keith’s eyes. 

“Keith,” he rasps out, his voice threadbare and hoarse. 

Keith’s expression ripples and settles into something more determined. He sits up but doesn’t stop touching Shiro. “I’m going to get you water.”

Keith shuffles to get out of the bed and Shiro grasps his wrist before he’s even fully aware that he’s doing it. Keith looks at his hand and then up at Shiro, expression sympathetic. 

“I’ll be right back,” Keith whispers, leaning in to kiss Shiro’s forehead. 

“I don’t—” Shiro begins, desperate, something like panic rising in his throat.

But Keith reaches out and takes his hand, uncurls it easily from his wrist and lifts it to press kisses over his knuckles. Then, he interlaces their fingers, holding it. 

“I’ll take you with me and then I’ll come right back,” Keith tells him, and takes one step back. He studies Shiro’s face to make sure it’s alright, but there’s reassurance in feeling Keith holding his hand. Shiro doesn’t nod, but he doesn’t protest, and so Keith walks off with Shiro’s prosthetic arm, fingers laced. Shiro listens as Keith rattles around in the bathroom, filling a cup with water. He moves slower than usual, unwilling to let go of Shiro’s hand. It’s profoundly reassuring to hear him moving, to hear his soft curse as he drops the cup in the sink and has to refill it. 

He returns soon enough and hands the water to Shiro. Shiro gulps it down, nearly choking in an effort to both swallow and breathe. Keith takes the glass from him and sets it down on the bedside table. Shiro watches him, desperately drinking in every reassuring movement Keith makes— he’s alive, he’s alive— and he tugs on Keith with his hand. Keith tumbles back into bed, pressing up to him. The long, lean line of his body is reassuring, radiating heat. He turns towards Keith, bows into his body, a sad parenthetical seeking its other half. Keith curls around him, holding him close. 

He strokes his hands over Shiro’s back, traces his spine, scritches at his neck and the softer fuzz of his hair at the nape. 

“Shiro,” Keith whispers, forehead pressed to the crown of Shiro’s head as he cradles him. 

Shiro lets out a rattling breath. He knows if he were to tell Keith he didn’t want to talk about it, he’d begrudgingly listen to him. But it’s been two weeks, and Keith isn’t going anywhere. He doesn’t want to lie to him, and even if it isn’t an outright lie, it feels too much like avoidance. He’s done too much of that with Keith in the time they’ve known each other. 

Still, he can’t speak the words, can’t admit to it— can’t stomach the thought of what Keith will look like, to have every fearful dream laid out between them, to reveal the full extent of his trauma. It isn’t a fear that Keith will judge him for it, it’s a fear that Keith will be too understanding, too reassuring, want to tell Shiro that he isn’t broken, that he isn’t wrong, that he isn’t a burden. 

They lie there in silence, but not fully comfortable— Keith never presses, but Shiro feels his heart thundering, trying to force himself to speak, to reassure Keith. 

Keith’s touch his gentle as he strokes his back and, before Shiro can continue to silently berate himself, speaks: “I have nightmares most nights, too, you know.” 

Shiro feels a spark of guilt because he _hadn’t_ known. He glances up at Keith, untucking himself from the hollow of Keith’s throat. 

“Our fight,” Shiro says, miserably. 

“Yeah,” Keith confirms with a small nod. 

It makes sense. Those first few weeks of being alive in this— his— body again, he’d spent the whole time convinced that Keith would flinch away from him, would be afraid of him, even if only on an instinctive level. While that never ended up happening, Keith still as open and present as he always was, forgiving Shiro instantly, it makes sense to Shiro that the fears would manifest as nightmares of their fight. Something hot pushes at the back of his eyes and Shiro clenches them shut quickly to fight back against another onslaught of shameful tears. 

Keith’s touch on his cheeks are gentle, reassuring, something that Shiro doesn’t deserve. 

“Do you remember when the facility was collapsing and we were hanging there?” Keith asks. 

Shiro nods. He remembers, but from the perspective of the Black Lion flying in to save Keith and Shiro. He has no memory from the body, hanging on only because Keith refused to let him go. By then, he’d already passed out, Haggar’s control fleeing, and it was only Shiro’s consciousness meshed with Black’s that allowed him to see and understand what Keith had done when the blade gave out under their joint weight. 

“Most of my nightmares are me trying to hold onto you… and not being able to,” Keith says. “You fall and I can’t save you.”

Keith’s expression remains calm but there’s the slightest break to his voice that betrays the way he truly feels and Shiro makes a mournful sound and pulls Keith into the circle of his arms, pressing light kisses over his face— his forehead, his nose, his cheeks, finally his lips. 

“ _Keith,_ ” Shiro whispers, desperately, for lack of anything else he can think to say, can’t put into words what hearing this does to him.

Keith smiles at him, light and gentle and heartbreaking, as he tips his head forward so their foreheads press together. 

“Being here with you helps,” Keith whispers. “I wake up and you’re right here in my arms. You’re safe.” 

Shiro’s answering smile is faint, pained. “You found me.” 

“I will _always_ find you,” Keith answers, with surety. His mouth trembles a little and for half a moment, his eyes look misty as he looks at Shiro. “But, ah… guess my sleeping brain haven’t gotten that memo yet.” 

“I dream about our fight, too,” Shiro says, because he knows this is why Keith has offered this up to him, to reassure him, to invite his own nightmares out into the open. Shiro’s instinct is to swallow it all back down, to spare Keith, but he knows Keith will never see it that way. “I…” he hesitates, but Keith looks at him, eyes level and certain, their faces still close together. “I kill you. You don’t— you always...” 

He clenches his eyes shut with a rattling breath and Keith makes a soft, pleading sound and cups his face, kissing him once. It helps, but the tension lances through Shiro’s body, his heart pounding. 

He breathes out shakily and finishes, “The way you look at me. You tell me you hate me. You’ll never forgive me. You die hating me.” 

“Never,” Keith answers, and Shiro knows that’s true— knows there could never be a scenario in which Keith could hate him— but still the reassurance makes something twisted up in his heart ease. 

“Keith,” he whispers and Keith kisses him again. 

“I _love_ you,” Keith says and Shiro, once again, marvels at how easily he offers it now, how unguarded his expression is when he says it. How they spent so many years swallowing this back and now, between them, it’s as easy as air. Shiro’s smile is wobbly but sincere and Keith’s eyes are soft as he looks at him. He traces his fingers over Shiro’s jaw and murmurs, “Nothing could ever change that, Shiro.” 

“I know,” Shiro answers, and he does know it. “I love you, too. I love you so much, I…” 

“I know,” Keith parrots, his smile gentler now. This time, he’s the one to tip forward and kiss every inch of Shiro’s face, tracing the line of his scar, down the line of his jaw, pressing last to his mouth already open for him. He lingers, kissing him long and slow until he’s pulled out every thread of Shiro’s breath. 

“And you saved me,” Shiro says, mouth brushing over Keith’s, unwilling to pull back from him. “You always do.”

“I always will,” Keith tells him, and there’s that spark in his eyes that makes Shiro feel protected, cherished. “I know they’re just dreams, but…”

“I know,” Shiro answers, voice soft. “They’re dreams, but they still— get me. If I ever lost you, Keith…”

He trials off, knows the danger of dwelling in such what-ifs. And yet. He closes his eyes and Keith’s mouth presses to the line of his eyebrow, the corner of his eye, his temple, the shell of his ear. 

Pressed to his ear, he whispers, “Sorry, Shiro. You’re stuck with me forever.” 

Shiro actually manages a laugh, watery and relieved. Rather than respond, he turns his face and cups Keith’s chin, kissing him properly. Keith melts into his touch, sighing out between kisses. His hair is soft when Shiro tangles his hand in his hair, cradles him closer. 

“I can handle forever,” Shiro replies, soft. 

“Any time you get that nightmare,” Keith tells him, “Just remember that it’s physically impossible for me to ever be anything but pathetically in love with you.” 

Shiro laughs again and this time doesn’t fight back the tears that slip down his cheeks. Keith is there to catch them, thumbs brushing the tears away. It’s reassuring when Keith makes no comment, doesn’t tell him to stop crying— just lets him and, as always, is there to catch him, to reassure him, to support him. 

“Me too,” he whispers and Keith smiles, the corners of his eyes crinkling in what will be, someday, wrinkles— when they’re older. Together. He blinks a few more times, clearing away the last of the tears in his eyes. He clears his throat. “I… I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep again tonight.” 

“That’s okay,” Keith reassures him, and squirms closer, cupping Shiro’s cheeks and kissing him softly, just a few firm presses of his mouth to his, breathing out between each. “Want to go racing? We can watch the sunrise out in the mountains.” 

Shiro’s mouth quirks into a small, pathetic smile, his heart thrumming with how much he loves this man. 

“Sounds perfect, Keith.”

**Author's Note:**

> This story is part of the [LLF Comment Project](https://longlivefeedback.tumblr.com/llfcommentproject) (including the [LLF Comment Builder](https://longlivefeedback.tumblr.com/commentbuilder)), which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites and appreciates responses, including:
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